A New Teaching System: The Serve: Swing Path

[johnyandell]

Would love to get your thoughts on my latest article "A New Teaching System: The Serve: Swing Path"

[nisinson]

Your website wont allow me to view videos in Quicktime

Your current issue wont ley me run programs in quicktime.
-David Nisinson

[johnyandell]

David,

Answered your email also. We need to know what platform you are on--it's probably something simple at your end...pc, mac, ipad??? QT definitely will work!!

[mlogarzo]

Hey John,

Great article. You may not remember me, but I did the demonstrations for Chris Lewit's kick serve article back when i was the Head Coach in his Academy in 07/08.

Have a few juniors I'm working with at the moment who really struggle with this after years and years of developing bad habits. Previous coaches haven't paid attention to it and it's been to detriment of their serve.

Your point re the face of the racquet being perpendicular to a line across the torso is spot on. I'm also a big believer in players being able to feel what they are doing and encourage shadowing the motion or specific parts of the motion that they need to correct. Find in particular girls struggle with this checkpoint and the pronating of the wrist after contact.

Have just started working with the top 16 year old girl in Australia and she's come to me with major confidence issues with her serve and I'm going to show her this video as a starting point. I've attached her serve, feel free to have a look.

[GeoffWilliams]

She does not extenally rotate her shoulder at all, nor coil her shoulders to the net. So no kinetic force is stored, and there is no snap back, nothing but all arm here.

[bman]

Actually that serve looked pretty darn good to me.

[tennis_chiro]

Pretty good.

I gotta agree with BMan. A lot of really good elements. Geoff may be correct that she could pull her shoulder back a little more, but I'd be more concerned with the initial rhythm of the toss. She is too deliberate at the beginning. I know the low start is very popular these days, but she is a natural to imitate Krajicek or Stich, my favorites. I'd get her hands a little closer together and a little higher and see if she could get a better rock and rhythm. Try to mimic Krajicek or Stich. It looks just a little contrived at the beginning for me. Then check the article about getting the racket face to go to full vertical following impact; she doesn't make it.

don

[klacr]

I know the low start is very popular these days, but she is a natural to imitate Krajicek or Stich, my favorites. I'd get her hands a little closer together and a little higher and see if she could get a better rock and rhythm. Try to mimic Krajicek or Stich. It looks just a little contrived at the beginning for me. Then check the article about getting the racket face to go to full vertical following impact; she doesn't make it.

don

Great Points tennis_chiro. Agree on those points. In full disclosure, you got me with the mention of Krajicek. He was my favorite server and thats how I modeled my serve. Great model.

The rock and rhythm seem non existent to me. It may just be the editing of the video as it starts quickly with the beginning of her motion. Perhaps getting more of her weight leaning forward at beginning of the motion will help and then transferring the weight back (pendulum). I'd love to see her pre-service ritual.

I also see that her racquet seems to be going forward towards target, not really vertical to the ball. I'd like to see her chest pointing upwards towards the tossed ball instead of towards the side fence.

Compared to many players, the serve is not that bad. A few adjustments but no major overhauls. Good luck with her.

Kyle LaCroix USPTA
Boca Raton

[julian1]

Percentage of serves in

Hey John,

Great article. You may not remember me, but I did the demonstrations for Chris Lewit's kick serve article back when i was the Head Coach in his Academy in 07/08.

Have a few juniors I'm working with at the moment who really struggle with this after years and years of developing bad habits. Previous coaches haven't paid attention to it and it's been to detriment of their serve.

Your point re the face of the racquet being perpendicular to a line across the torso is spot on. I'm also a big believer in players being able to feel what they are doing and encourage shadowing the motion or specific parts of the motion that they need to correct. Find in particular girls struggle with this checkpoint and the pronating of the wrist after contact.

Have just started working with the top 16 year old girl in Australia and she's come to me with major confidence issues with her serve and I'm going to show her this video as a starting point. I've attached her serve, feel free to have a look.

Hi,
do you have any ball park numbers about her serve percentage?

[stotty]

Like it...looks really promising

Hey John,

Great article. You may not remember me, but I did the demonstrations for Chris Lewit's kick serve article back when i was the Head Coach in his Academy in 07/08.

Have a few juniors I'm working with at the moment who really struggle with this after years and years of developing bad habits. Previous coaches haven't paid attention to it and it's been to detriment of their serve.

Your point re the face of the racquet being perpendicular to a line across the torso is spot on. I'm also a big believer in players being able to feel what they are doing and encourage shadowing the motion or specific parts of the motion that they need to correct. Find in particular girls struggle with this checkpoint and the pronating of the wrist after contact.

Have just started working with the top 16 year old girl in Australia and she's come to me with major confidence issues with her serve and I'm going to show her this video as a starting point. I've attached her serve, feel free to have a look.

I think her serve is real nice overall. The only real change I would make other than perhaps one already mentioned is how the start of the motion is initiated. Her racket arm sets off slightly earlier of the throwing arm. She manages to compensate nicely and gets into a good trophy position...but I would reverse that...or better still...get both arms off at the same time but with the throwing arm going off slightly quicker than the racket arm, so the racket arm has to catch up a bit.

I am just wondering whether setting off a tad early with the racket arm has caused rhythm problems, resulting the lack of confidence you mention. I have found this some players with similar technique in the past. As they descend deeper into matches things start to go more out of synch. It's hard to say with a player as good as Zoe without seeing how her serve performs throughout the course of a match.

It's certainly very close to being a good serve and much better looking than some you see on the women's tour. No unresolvable problems that I can see.

Be interesting to see what John thinks...and don_budge who is somewhat of a maestro when it comes to serves.

[johnyandell]

Michael,

Hey you were the only one who could kick the serve over the back fence! How are you mate!

First would love to see a rear view to look at the left to rigth axis of the contact and the drop although I think it looks damn good from the side. Main thing as has been noted, the limited hand and arm rotation as evidenced by the racket position in the followthrough. Not a true platform stance but at least not an extreme pinpoint (that's me versus Chris...) and at least some turn off the ball!!

[don_budge]

Major confidence issues...it's no wonder

Have a few juniors I'm working with at the moment who really struggle with this after years and years of developing bad habits. Previous coaches haven't paid attention to it and it's been to detriment of their serve.

Have just started working with the top 16 year old girl in Australia and she's come to me with major confidence issues with her serve and I'm going to show her this video as a starting point. I've attached her serve, feel free to have a look.

First of all...thanks for sharing mlogarzo. It's very generous of you.

One of the major problems in the tennis world today is that coaches seem to be unable to "build" a sound service motion. A big reason for that is that motions are no longer designed to be followed into the net. Instead the server tries for the big delivery then backs up. This kind of behavior is a fundamental change...much as society has changed with the use of the cell phone. Now you must begin to ask yourself what are the ramifications of such behavior changes. Here is a very good example. I wonder if there are problems in the second serve delivery. I imagine that there are.

It's no wonder that this girl is suffering from major confidence issues because she has some major mechanical issues going on in her service motion. tennis_chiro attributes it to rhythm. GeoffWilliams attributes it to lack of shoulder rotation. klacr adds that more weight should be placed on the front foot...or front leg. Stotty shows the most acumen...he suggests calling in the good doctor don_budge, the metaphysical engineer. They are all right but there is more.

Whenever this young lady is in a tight situation she is going to have an anxiety attack because she knows...her body knows that there is something really wrong here with the rhythm. She is going to struggle to hold on to the faulty rhythm that she uses...although that being said she very well may get away with it most of the time, more often than not, because the lack of significance that the serve has on the way the game is being played today. Particularly on the woman's side. But things can get a bit dicey once that confidence in your rhythm goes...the rest of the game can go right down with it.

The proof is in the video...do you see that 18 story building directly behind her? Her toss goes above that structure and probably 3 or 4 stories higher than that but that is something that we will never know. She has thrown the ball completely out of the view of the camera. Yet, she is making contact with the ball at the level of the 12th story. Just imagine the effect that the wind alone could play havoc with the timing of the swing, the contact and the toss. Sometimes it pays to pay attention to what is in the background. Most people see what they want to see and disregard the rest.

The ball should only drop a maximum of a decimeter and to me there is absolutely no reason for the ball to not be struck at practically the precise apex of the toss. When teaching the overhead smash I begin with the tennis student bouncing the ball as opposed to hitting on the fly...and this is what I would compare this young ladies service motion to. She is attempting to smash a very high lob as opposed to letting the ball bounce. The significance of her high toss has some really bad implications for the motion. The question is why does she throw it so high. The answer...to compensate for the rest of the convoluted motion. I like to think of the serve as an upside down golf swing in some respects and if you are going to tee it up why not tee it up where you are going to make contact. A lot of problems in golf swings come from compensating moves and the same can be safely said with tennis service motions.

What is more...I know exactly why her toss is too high. I beg to differ...this serve needs to be rethought, retooled and rebuilt from scratch. Rebuilt on the lost art of the fundamental service motion. Anything less will be a disSERVICE to this tennis student.

[stroke]

Michael,

Hey you were the only one who could kick the serve over the back fence! How are you mate!

First would love to see a rear view to look at the left to rigth axis of the contact and the drop although I think it looks damn good from the side. Main thing as has been noted, the limited hand and arm rotation as evidenced by the racket position in the followthrough. Not a true platform stance but at least not an extreme pinpoint (that's me versus Chris...) and at least some turn off the ball!!

I like her motion, but her followthrough does possibly indicate too much arm, or acceleration after contact, instead of before contact. There are a couple of tennis coaches I have read, Dave Smith and Jeff Counts, that suggest that a great way to check/diagnose your serve for proper followthrough/arm action is to put a towel down on the court and serve on both your knees. If you hit the ground on the followthrough instead of having more of the Sampras type snap finish(which would not even come close to hitting the ground), it indicates too much arm/muscle type action.

[stotty]

Racket drop...and something else.

Does having a deeper racket drop result in more power? I was looking through a couple of BG's articles and he seems to suggest it does. Is it a case of the deeper, the better?

Also, how significant is the angle of the bend/break at the elbow as the racket hits the bottom of the racket drop and starts the upward swing? A video taken from above would reveal this best, but there are two clips in the archive that reveal enough...and have intrigued me for some time.

Both players in the clips, Ferrero and Murray, bend very moderately at the elbow in the trophy position, but Murray's elbow is breaking far more than Ferrero's as the upward swing commences. You have to toggle through the clips and pause them at the start of the upward swing to view what I mean. I wondered if this is a factor with players in terms of power or even spin? I wonder if any research has ever been done in this area as, generally speaking, this takes place out of eyeshot of the observer and requires shots taken from directly above the player's head to truly reveal the angle of the bend?

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/strokearchive/pro_men/andy_murray/am_serve/am_arm_action/am_arm_action.html?AM1stSDeuceArmActionSide1.mov

http://www.tennisplayer.net/members/strokearchive/pro_men/jcferrero/jcferrero_serve/jcf_1st_serve/jcf_1st_serve.html?JCFerrero1stSDeuceCourtLevelSide1.mov

[GeoffWilliams]

Sampras' elbow was extremely straight up, and his back arched way back, to allow his elbow to point up more, and his frame to reach a lower point, and to go far further under his elbow to the rear. The higher the elbow at drop, the more power available.